


dream of you till i am gone

by arrows (orphan_account)



Category: Marvel
Genre: 5+1 Things, And Then Kissing, Dreams, Drowning, F/M, Kissing, Non-Graphic Violence, Red Room, References to Underage Sex, Starvation, Torture, Um Lots Of Non-Graphic Torture Really, Well Something Almost Happens But Then It Doesn't
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-01
Updated: 2013-06-01
Packaged: 2017-12-13 14:29:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/825356
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/arrows
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Natalia Romanova rarely dreams. When she does, they are usually memories. </p><p>Five memories and a dream.</p>
            </blockquote>





	dream of you till i am gone

_i._  
Cold hands throw her into the metal container and ignore her screams and struggling. Water rushes up to her, displaced around her body and reaching just below her nose. She cannot scream. Can hardly breathe. The world is going dark and nobody is there to help her in the tank.

 _ii._  
She is woken by alarms and rushed outside by men in coats. She wears only her underwear and a loose shirt. The Russian winter is unforgiven, she feels her toes freeze before they even reach the lake. When she is pushed in, she nearly dies. Nearly, because she is the Black Widow, and she is not allowed to die.

 _iii._  
There are things worse than death. The tank is among them, but this is the worst. The same cold hands put her into a room; she has given up on screaming and struggling by now. Time passes slowly and the noise starts only when she is about to close her eyes, the light comes when the sounds don't work. She screams and begs but they don't care.

 _iv._  
You have failed your country, he says, and he is right. She has failed. She stares down at her feet but it is not enough. We are very disappointed, you will be punished, we do not accept failures. You are but a tool for us to use for the advancement of the Red Room. She listens but doesn't and thinks on her actions and finds she is not sorry.

 _v._  
She kills a man when she is fourteen and feels no remorse until years later. A hotel bedroom in Moscow, her hair is dyed and her makeup done to make her look a few years older and she stabs the man through his heart before he has the chance to get his pants down. The remorse is not for killing him, it's for the sloppiness she did it with. Really, she could have been so much neater.

 _+_  
The first time she truly dreams, she is nineteen. She dreams of brown hair like dirt after the rain and eyes that are empty. A cold arm, grey and red. She dreams that he kisses her, chastely on the cheek. It is the best thing she could hope for; nobody is ever gentle, nobody thinks she might need someone to care for her. She doesn't even think it, not consciously.

The next day while they are training, the Black Widow stands on her toes to match his height and kisses the Winter Soldier hard on the mouth, and he buries his cold metal arm in her hair and it is nothing like the dream she has long forgotten.

**Author's Note:**

> Comment if you like it, please!


End file.
